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The mess of moving your phone
to Comcast et al without
Local Number Portability (LNP)
In order for you to learn from the experience of others, I offer the following discussion on how to avoid problems when attempting to move data communications services between vendors, and the problems their personnel insert into the process.
The time came when we planned to move from our home to an apartment that we knew had Comcast as their primary supplier of communication capabilities.
To get the capability of having our AT&T phone number appear at the new location, about December 10 I requested that the phone be maintained, but that AT&T should plan to move the phone on December 29. AT&T countered that they needed to observe the facilities at the new location and to ascertain if there were any problems. The request was reasonable, as AT&T needed to see if there was a common point accessible to them and to assure that they could hook into any wiring panel in the basement of the building. So it didn't bother me that the anticipated dead phone was present on December 23rd, but it did surprise me that the interruption went on for hours.
I called AT&T and asked when the service would be restored and I was told that the service had been cancelled! Further probing revealed that some overzealous AT&T person had interpreted that the testing of the line was a cancellation of the order and so our service was cancelled. Needless to say-invoking the name of the FCC and other agencies-I explained to the representative that the line had not been cancelled but merely released for testing purposes.
Once the attention of AT&T was secured, the process of canceling the cancellation order began and we had phone service back around 6 p.m. That took care of the screw up, but left the basic question of the accessibility of having a phone with our old number as compared to having to start over with some assigned number issued by Comcast.
On the above item, I filed an electronic complaint with the FCC on the actions of AT&T. I am convinced that it was my threats to AT&T to file that made the giant respond to the problems. They had two persons working on the problem to assure that I was happy - which I was not.
It seems that Comcast approached the apartment house management into which we were to move with the offer to wire the entire 182 apartments for FREE! This had the effect of locking all of the apartments into Comcast, as the apartment managers did not design into the plans any additional conduits for the AT&T type of installations. AT&T was locked out! Whether this is legal is TBD, when I have the time for more research.
In the meantime, I issued the order that our phone number be transported to Comcast by AT&T, as a result of inputs from both John Buck and Roger Summit, who both picked up on an alternate way of getting what was wanted, which was Local Number Portability (LNP). This was entered by AT&T who then instituted a 5‑day delay for processing of the order. By approaching AT&T early, the 5‑day delay and outage of the primary phone number was hoped to be avoided. In practice the delays went on for 10+ days of no service.
Then I tried to get the Comcast representative to get me an account and to have it modified. I tried for three days to get the Comcast representative to respond. It turned out he was out of town, with no backup person in place. Nothing worked, so I issued an order directly to the retail Comcast location which got an account in Comcast for AT&T to process the order.
Eventually, the Comcast salesperson assigned to the apartment complex returned to town and saw that the Comcast contract was not correct, so he canceled the order. The cancellation caused AT&T to unlock the transfer for another 5 days so we had an additional 5‑day period without AT&T phone service (for 10 days total) before anything significant was completed by AT&T.
I filed another complaint with the FCC against Comcast.
In all, over this mess I filed four complaints. As near as I can tell, the FCC did nothing other than to take the report(s). So there we were, stuck with Comcast as a captive who provided a phone service:
The lessons to be learned here are to check out the facilities carefully and to assure that the capabilities of the receiving location meet your standards and needs.
I am not using my Comcast number Use my AT&T number: 650-493-9307
You can learn more about local number portability (LNP) via http://tinyurl.com/yb75r7n.